I received a resume from a student about to graduate with an MBA. The candidate went straight from her undergraduate to graduate school. During both programs, she held a series of entry level retail jobs.
This career progression shows a good commitment and work ethic. The problem with the resume is the order of the information. It emphasizes the work history and not the education. The job seeker is not going to land the type of job she is pursuing based on her work experience. She’s going to get hired because of her education. This needs to be emphasized as the main selling point.
Below is the resume structure:
Summary Statement (19 words, does not mention the education, focused on the work experience)
Experience
- Job 1 (127 words)
- Job 2 (75 words)
- Job 3 (70 words)
Education
- Master’s Degree
- Bachelor’s Degree
Skills
The entire resume had 387 words, so the listing of the three jobs represents 70% of the text. It’s also at the top of the resume. There’s a good chance a hiring manager receiving this resume will read the summary statement, skim the work experience and discard the candidate. This is unfortunate, because the job seeker has some great skills and a very good education.
A better way to organize this resume would be to focus on the education and skills of the job seeker. A hiring manager is going to be impressed with the potential of the job seeker, not the jobs she has held. The jobs help show her work ethic, but this is just one attribute. The experience should be placed in a supporting role, not the lead.
I would reorganize this resume into the following order:
Summary Statement (emphasizing the education and key skills)
Education
- Master’s Degree
- Bachelor’s Degree
Skills
Experience
Job 1 (127 words)
- Job 2 (75 words)
- Job 3 (70 words)
This structure leads off with the candidate’s strengths. The content didn’t change (except for the summary statement). Only the organization of the content changed. The other option I considered was switching the skills and education. As impressive as the education is, the job seeker possesses some great skills that might be more impressive for some careers. In this case, leading off with the skills would be better than starting with the education.